Nic Granlund Makes History at Glen Helen

As the race weekend approached, Nic Granlund’s excitement was building. Nic had recently raced the dirt series event two weeks earlier and had great success taking home four trophies.

After practice on Friday, Nic made only small adjustments to the tuning of his Fox Shox before Saturday’s race of the Pro Production class which includes turbo/super-charged and fully modified engines. This class is considered to be the premier racing class in the WORCS SxS series. Nic had recently spent considerable time working with Packard Performance fine tuning the new supercharge system for the Yamaha.

Nic anticipated a good result.

The line up of the start is determined by accumulated points. This season Nic had not participated in many of the Pro Production class races and therefore started on the second row. A rare occurrence for Nic in most races.

​​Nic anxiously waited the 30 second delay between the first and second row start. Once the green flag dropped, Nic was quick off the line. In a three way battle for the hole shot, Nic backed off and took the third position exiting the first turn.

For the first 1½ laps Nic pressured the driver ahead taking on dirt and mud from an extremely muddy track. Nic made a move quickly to overtake. By this time, the field narrowed and he was quickly catching competitors from the first row. By the final stretch of the race Nic’s Yamaha YXZ 1000R performed flawlessly allowing Nic to maintain a fast and vigorous pace. Nic continued to pass riders from the first row. Nic had the leaders in sight and knew with time correction he had a chance at a podium position. Nic kept an aggressive pace driving hard all the way to the checkered flag. On corrected time, Nic took the win earning the top spot on the podium claiming Yamaha’s first win in the Pro Production class.

Round 9 WORCS Pro Stock Class

In prepare for Sunday’s Pro Stock race, Nic noticed only after his finish, that he had managed to get two flats in the last race. To augment the superior quality of GBC tires, Nic also uses TireBlocks which combat the risk of flats common to off-road racing. “I chose the GBC Mongrels because of the great traction and they are very predictable and consistent and by adding TireBlocks, I can be more aggressive in rough terrain and take on areas that normally I would have to be more strategic about.” Nic’s Pro Stock car is a near replica of his Pro Production car, utilizing the same components supplied by his sponsors, the difference being the Pro Stock car has only the allowable engine modifications which include a Weller exhaust and tune.

As a result of series points, Nic lined up on the front row. This time he had an even better start off the line, battling for the holeshot at the first turn, coming out in the number two position. Once again, due to the high heat and strong winds the track was a combination of mud and dust. Visibility was poor through the first couple of laps, riding on the back of the leader Nic made a small mistake overshooting a corner and fell back three to four seconds. Now having clear vision Nic was able to pick up the pace and close the gap quickly. At the same time, Nic and the leader caught lappers from other classes. When the leader went wide Nic capitalized and took the lead and began to pull away. For the next few laps it was Nic’s turn to deal with the lappers, some proved to be more difficult to move past than others. Yet Nic was able to drive mistake free to the end of the race and was first to take the finish line flag, thereby capturing his 2nd win of the weekend. This was the first time ever that anyone had won the SXS Pro Production and SXS Pro Stock classes in the same weekend. “This was a great win not only for me but for all my sponsors. With their support, we put together a race winning package of quality products that is testimony to the hours I’ve put in and the work they have done to get to this point.